Las Vegas thread and MSE guide 2009 part 2

skippa59

August

Heading out to Vegas next Sunday.Not a great poster but admit to being a long time lurker (hate that word) would like to thank everyone who contributes here for all the useful advice. Don`t know if this will help anyone but if you have any friends who are holidaying in the US check if they bring money back as we had friends who came back with over $1000 and there buyback rate was 1.76 and they offered them to us at 1.70 so at the time that was 5c above what we could get. So everyone ended up happy

ferf1223

October , November

skippa59 wrote: »

Don`t know if this will help anyone but if you have any friends who are holidaying in the US check if they bring money back as we had friends who came back with over $1000 and there buyback rate was 1.76 and they offered them to us at 1.70 so at the time that was 5c above what we could get. So everyone ended up happy

My boss and I did that once - he won back some of what he'd lost on his last day so came back with more $$ than expected so sold them to me for better than I could get buying and better than he could get selling.

stoneman

September

pennylane99 wrote: »

Thanks

its a repeat from a few months ago, you can also watch it online at 4oD if you miss it on tv

http://www.channel4.com/programmes/a-place-in-the-sun-home-or-away/4od#2931711

Just watched this with Tracy. One word "muppets". you wait till they have to deal with the builders, they will be wishing they took the house in Henderson.
We are in contact with an agent who is also a barman at Bellagio, he sends us details of properties all the time. At the moment they are selling 2 bed condo foreclosures in Lake Las Vegas for $70,000

Goldust

I've just been given some time off in September from the 2nd to the 12th and would like to go to Vegas for 8 to 10 days. Everything seems to be expensive know because it's so last minute - am i wasting my time looking for a flight that is £400 or less that is direct?

Maybe I should park the idea until a good deal comes about unless anyone has any tips for me?

Need to fly from Manchester!

Thanks!

wdyw

You might get lucky with the Mytravel/TC/airtours direct flight. Last couple of flights this month were low 300's when i looked a few days ago, so with a bit of luck the first week of September might be round the same (they werre more expensive but still a bit too far away to get the really low prices). Unfortunately you won't be able to see sensible prices until after the weekend as they like to fleece the punters at the weekend when most people book holidays.

SimbaSimon

October , November

Hi All,

We booked our trip to Vegas in December and the time is quickly approaching! We leave in November for 8 nights staying at the Stratosphere, which were very happy with and were not put off because of the location. I'm thinking of renting a car for the duration of our trip which is about £109 for the 9 days plus a crazy surcharge for being under 25 :eek: . The surcharge of car hire doesn't bother me but I'm trying to budget for all our expenses.

I've heard traffic can be a bit of a mare down the strip, so is driving from the stratosphere to the other end of the question unless I want to spend ages in traffic? Or shall I use the bus/monorail, in which case I need to factor this into our budget. We're planning on doing a few trips which are a bit further out so the car would come in useful on some days regardless.

Simon

tingtong

SimbaK2K wrote: »

I've heard traffic can be a bit of a mare down the strip, so is driving from the stratosphere to the other end of the question unless I want to spend ages in traffic? Or shall I use the bus/monorail, in which case I need to factor this into our budget. We're planning on doing a few trips which are a bit further out so the car would come in useful on some days regardless.

Depending on how far down the strip you are going, you'd be much better off going down the Interstate (I15) in the car, if time is important. Whenever I've been, the strip is pretty much chaos as far as traffic is concerned.

I personally don't really like the Deuce bus as it seems to take a long time to get anywhere (big queues), although it may not be as bad when you are going.

Being based in the Stratosphere, you are quite close to a monorail station (behind Sahara) so this will probably be your best bet - straight down to MGM. I think you can get multi-trip tickets so this maybe be the way to go for you. EDIT: 3-day pass is $28 per person.

We tend to just walk everywhere, although we've never been based as far north as Stratosphere.

ferf1223

October , November

SimbaK2K wrote: »

I've heard traffic can be a bit of a mare down the strip, so is driving from the stratosphere to the other end of the question unless I want to spend ages in traffic? Or shall I use the bus/monorail, in which case I need to factor this into our budget. We're planning on doing a few trips which are a bit further out so the car would come in useful on some days regardless.

We always have a car and use it most days. We occasionally take the monorail (but less-so since they stopped doing the 10-ride passes and we had 2-for-1 coupons for them!)...occasionally taxi. Yes, traffic on the strip can be terrible, but in our experience it's not that bad during the day on weekdays - we're regularly out and about in the car and don't have too much trouble. Evenings and weekends are a different story though. I don't think you'd have a massive amount of traffic heading from Strat to say Mandalay Bay in the morning or afternoon though. The plus side is that in most cases when traffic is bad, everything's moving so slowly that it's not scary traffic. Knowing the non-strip/alternative routes can greatly reduce your traffic sitting time.

I refuse to take a bus on holiday so I've never tried the Deuce, but have read too many stories about how it takes ages to get anywhere to even consider it.

Monorail can be handy but can be expensive relatively speaking. I agree that if you're going to use it a lot (and being based at the Strat, you may want to if you don't have a car) a multi-day pass might be decent value - but in some cases depending on how much you were to ride it and if there are 2 or more of you, a taxi to X point each day and back to the Strat at the end of each day might be cheaper...plus while it's not that far from the Strat to Sahara it's another walk to the monorail, so the time it takes to walk there or back might get old.

stoneman

September

SimbaK2K wrote: »

Hi All,

I've heard traffic can be a bit of a mare down the strip, so is driving from the stratosphere to the other end of the question unless I want to spend ages in traffic? Or shall I use the bus/monorail, in which case I need to factor this into our budget. We're planning on doing a few trips which are a bit further out so the car would come in useful on some days regardless.

Simon

Two words, Paradise and Industrial. We haven't traveled down the strip in a car in years. Use these 2 roads and you will knock ages of time off of any trip. For example, come out of Strat. towards the strip, turn left onto E. Sahara , first right onto Paridise, and you can get as far as the Luxor in less than 10 minutes. Or out of Strat. turn right at W. Sahara, first right onto Northbridge street. Then left onto Industrial if you want to hit anywhere on that side of the road.

luci

September

Can anyone tell me the bus number/route to get to the Premium Outlets on the back roads from around Ellis Island? I have looked at the RTC website, but I'm directionally challenged and couldn't quite work it out.

We normally take the Deuce, but it is very slow and wondered if there was a quicker way by bus.